Russia Vows to Prevent Bloodshed in Ukraine as Forces Control Missile Unit in Crimea

Local Editor

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov vowed to prevent bloodshed in Ukraine as forces partly controlled a second missile defense unit in Crimea.

"We will not allow bloodshed. We will not allow attempts against the lives and wellbeing of those who live in Ukraine and Russian citizens who live in Ukraine," visiting Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told a news conference in Madrid.

A day after US President Barack Obama said Russia was "not fooling anybody" over its role in Ukraine, Lavrov insisted the armed troops were not taking orders from the Kremlin.

"If they are the self-defense forces created by the inhabitants of Crimea, we have no authority over them," Lavrov said.
He further affirmed: "They do not receive our orders."

The Russian foreign minister, who left Madrid for a Paris meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry after the conference, said Moscow would not allow bloodshed to erupt in Ukraine.
"We will not allow bloodshed. We will not allow attempts against the lives and wellbeing of those who live in Ukraine and Russian citizens who live in Ukraine," he said.

Meanwhile, at one base in Cape Fiolent, near the city of Sevastopol in southern Crimea, Russian soldiers hold some parts of the base although the missile depot remains in Ukrainian hands, Volodymyr Bova, a defense ministry spokesman in the disputed Black Sea peninsula.

Pro-Moscow forces are also in partial control of a second base in Evpatoria, which does not have missiles on its grounds.
Ukrainian soldiers still held the command post and control center there, said another spokesman for the defense ministry in Kiev, Oleksey Mazepa.

The takeovers seemed to have occurred without any violence, officials said.
Russian-speaking Crimea has come under de-facto control by pro-Russian forces since the ousting of pro-Kremlin president Viktor Yanukovych and the installation of a new pro-European government in Kiev.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team